Re: Fuck the Republican Party.

Originally Posted by bobert

Couldn't that logic be applied to numerous professions though? Seems like there must be millions of examples of people starting their own businesses without any formal education and learning on the job. To me, "trade" always implied some kind of manual labor or construction.

This whole conversation started with grannock saying college was worthless, and I said a BA was a minimum requirements for virtually all quality (non-menial) jobs these days, because of the shift in the economy, etc etc etc, and i specifically excluded 'the trades' from this characterization. Then Randy chimed in about what he does, and I said ok, to me that's part of my "the trades" exception, but people seemed to think that was a denegration when it wasn't. Anyway, starting your own company is really not the same thing as trying to get a job, so we've gone way off track here.

So I will stick to my guns but soften my wording to placate the panties-in-a-bunch set: A college education significantly enhances one's ability to get a decent job with a decent career trajectory, and in many fields it is a minimum requirement, though there certainly are exceptions like the trades and entrepreneurship and whatever you want to call the guys who work on your network server.

Re: Fuck the Republican Party.

Just as long as when someone tells you they "work in IT" you don't assume they must have attained their training for an institution that advertises on late night basic cable. There are a lot of business skills involved in it these days.

Since technology permeates just about every aspect of professional and social life these days the term is obsolete, but we're at a point where most lay folks don't realize that yet.

It's like you're calling all types of EDM "techno" (I realize that analogy is happily worthless to you though).

Re: Fuck the Republican Party.

Re: Fuck the Republican Party.

Originally Posted by TomAz

Even I know the difference between techno and dubstep. duh.

I'm going to quiz you on the difference between trap and moombahton.

but my point (should have been) that the term EDM is analogous to IT. "EDM" was once descriptive since there wasn't a whole lot of music that could be made with machines alone. Now that most popular music is made with varying amounts of computer generated music and that music is increasingly varied, the term has lost meaning.

Re: Fuck the Republican Party.

Originally Posted by TomAz

Even I know the difference between techno and dubstep. duh.

both are shitty just like republicans

Originally Posted by mncarpooler

Anything that's not Sahara tent trash is going to have a small crowd it seems like. I wandered over near the Sahara once all weekend and it was a clusterfuck of the douchiest looking people you could ever imagine.

Re: Fuck the Republican Party.

Re: Fuck the Republican Party.

Originally Posted by TomAz

This whole conversation started with grannock saying college was worthless, and I said a BA was a minimum requirements for virtually all quality (non-menial) jobs these days, because of the shift in the economy, etc etc etc, and i specifically excluded 'the trades' from this characterization. Then Randy chimed in about what he does, and I said ok, to me that's part of my "the trades" exception, but people seemed to think that was a denegration when it wasn't. Anyway, starting your own company is really not the same thing as trying to get a job, so we've gone way off track here.

So I will stick to my guns but soften my wording to placate the panties-in-a-bunch set: A college education significantly enhances one's ability to get a decent job with a decent career trajectory, and in many fields it is a minimum requirement, though there certainly are exceptions like the trades and entrepreneurship and whatever you want to call the guys who work on your network server.

It feels to me like the distinction that you're making is that a "profession" is something you literally CAN'T do without a degree (doctor, lawyer, certain other positions) and anything else is a trade. I mean, Bill Gates is a tradesman? Mark Zuckerburg?

You can isolate it to just what I do and call it a trade I guess, and it's not that I'm taking offense (okay, maybe a little) but I don't see how, say, computer programming is a "trade." Like, fucking seriously. Inventing software is a trade?

Originally Posted by amyzzz

Hannah, I don't know that pigs have big weiners, and my early 20's facination with dogs because of weiner size, I think. If that helps.

Re: Fuck the Republican Party.

Borowitz:

WASHINGTON (The Borowitz Report)—Official Washington was in celebration mode on New Year’s Day after kind of averting a completely unnecessary crisis that was entirely of its own creation.

“This deal proves that if we all procrastinate long and hard enough, we can semi-solve any self-inflicted problem at the very last minute in a way that satisfies no one,” said Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Kentucky).

But even as Sen. McConnell basked in self-congratulation, he warned Congress against the complacency that could come with having sort of fixed its own completely avoidable mess.

“This is a new year, and much work remains to be done,” he said. “It’s up to us to concoct entirely new optional disasters that we will have to undo at some later date in a more or less half-assed way.”

In a related story, an arsonist received an award for putting out his own fire.

Re: Fuck the Republican Party.

Re: Fuck the Republican Party.

Originally Posted by RotationSlimWang

It feels to me like the distinction that you're making is that a "profession" is something you literally CAN'T do without a degree (doctor, lawyer, certain other positions) and anything else is a trade. I mean, Bill Gates is a tradesman? Mark Zuckerburg?

You can isolate it to just what I do and call it a trade I guess, and it's not that I'm taking offense (okay, maybe a little) but I don't see how, say, computer programming is a "trade." Like, fucking seriously. Inventing software is a trade?

It's not like you can go to a trade school and become a computer programmer... oh wait... you can? Well I'll be....

Re: Fuck the Republican Party.

Yes, the Social Security/Medicare funding aspect of the payroll tax cut would have been alarming but for the fact that Congress maintained funding levels for the programs through other revenue streams.

Re: Fuck the Republican Party.

Oh and by the way, if we do absolutely nothing, Social Security is 100% solvent for like the next thirty years. Anyone who is preaching an impeding Social Security crisis is selling you something, most likely a scheme to hand over Social Security to Wall Street.

Re: Fuck the Republican Party.

Originally Posted by Miroir Noir

Yes, the Social Security/Medicare funding aspect of the payroll tax cut would have been alarming but for the fact that Congress maintained funding levels for the programs through other revenue streams.

I did not know that. For the last two years, how did they fund the 'holiday'? And now that it's over, what is that funding source going towards?

*edit: Nevermind, it was financed by debt. I guess if you're the type that considers debt an 'other revenue stream', that's cool.

Re: Fuck the Republican Party.

Here's the other thing about Social Security: when I say 100% solvent, that doesn't mean that thirty years from now, the program goes bankrupt. It means that unless policy changes are enacted, it will begin to start paying less benefits than are currently promised. So instead of 100% of your promised benefit, you may get 80%. A problem, no doubt. But a very long term one that is far from catastrophic and eminently solvable. Especially without doing something dumb, like changing a defined social insurance benefit into a public 401k system.

The right wingers and deficit scolds are right that we do need to do something about Medicare, but they're off in their diagnosis of the problem. That impending crisis is being driven more by skyrocketing medical costs, less with any design flaw in the system.

Re: Fuck the Republican Party.

Originally Posted by PlayaDelWes

*edit: Nevermind, it was financed by debt. I guess if you're the type that considers debt an 'other revenue stream', that's cool.

So are the continued tax cuts for income between $250K and $400K and the continued evisceration of most of the estate tax not also technically financed by debt? And are they nearly as stimulative or progressive as the payroll tax cut?

Re: Fuck the Republican Party.

Originally Posted by Miroir Noir

So are the continued tax cuts for income between $250K and $400K and the continued evisceration of most of the estate tax not also technically financed by debt? And are they nearly as stimulative or progressive as the payroll tax cut?

That's the issue for me.

Not just for the range you called out, but any continued break or deduction is naturally going to limit tax revenues. And for expenditures that can’t be funded by that income, of course you need to draw from debt to cover the deficit.I just find it alarming that the mindset of some is to consider debt as income. That’s all.